*Congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis (D-Ga.) showed his support Monday morning at Occupy Atlanta, a spin-off of Occupy Wall Street, when he made an appearance with a small entourage.
Maybe we should make it clear that he tried to show support.
His goal was to give a few words of support and overall words of wisdom, but the chanting cadence spewing from the unison crowd prevented the congressman from even speaking.
Actually, the assembly rules are such that a consensus must be made before anyone can make a public announcement.
Some protesters didn’t think Lewis was entitled to special treatment, others were quite outraged that he didn’t get a chance to speak.
“To #occupyatlanta general assembly. U are a bunch of d***heads. Congressman John Lewis is an American hero,” hip hop mogul, Russell Simmons later tweeted.
“In order for #occupywallstreet to succeed we are gonna need John Lewis to write legislation,” he added.
Meanwhile, Lewis made the following statement in response to his treatment:
“Occupy Wall Street is saying, ‘We will not take it anymore.’ They are saying we must not forget about those in need, about those who work for starvation wages, those who bear their burden in the heat of the day and in the darkness of the night.”
I’m a bit confused, but to the best of my ability to decipher what was going on, the consensus was that he should speak. But it seems the moderator wanted to sabotage that as much as possible. So even after there was a unanimous show of hands for him to speak, he keeps giving the mic to these idiots who were mostly spewing incoherent and confusing bull shyt.
No wonder after all that, no one seems to know what was going on.
No wonder the right wing media is portraying them as disorganized.
But I’m guessing they are going to lose some points after pulling this stunt. I don’t think any of the yt guest speakers got treated like this so far. A few people are now going to start wondering if they are really that different from the tea party.
“But I’m guessing they are going to lose some points after pulling this stunt.”
Damn sure will. That was completely unnecessary to treat him in that manner. Maybe some Tea Partiers have infiltrated their ranks and this is a good way to cause ‘serious’ divisions.
Haven’t seen the video but Lewis or no other politician (who hasn’t been out in front of this) should NOT be allowed to speak and I don’t care if Lewis is that person. He and other members of congress haven’t done their job and I applaud anyone for saying “you had your chance.”
Good for them. They should do the same for all politicians with the exception of a few….
I cringed when I read this story. I think it was in bad taste for that protester to do what he did. I understand the reluctance to allow the limp Dems to co-opt the Occpy Wall Street message–they should keep their protest anti-partisan imo, it gives them more credibility–but allowing John Lewis to speak would have elevated the cause to a degree. I suspect that protestor whoever he is will be read the riot act by fellow protestors. He has almost single-handedly dismantled the positivity energy this movement had engendered.